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Scream (film)
Scream is a 1996 American slasher-comedy horror film directed by Wes Craven from a screenplay by Kevin Williamson. It was released by Dimension Films. Filmed mostly in Santa Rosa, California, the film tells the story of the fictional town Woodsboro, California being terrorized by a masked killer who enjoys tormenting his victims with phone calls and movie references. The killer's main target is Sidney Prescott (Neve Campbell), a teenage girl whose mother, Maureen, fell victim to a brutal murder one year earlier. The film takes the form of a "whodunit" mystery, with many of her friends and townspeople being fellow targets and suspects. Released in the United States on December 20, 1996 Scream was a box office success, grossing $173,046,663 internationally and received very positive reviews from critics as the review aggregation website Rotten Tomatoes awarded the film an 81% 'fresh' rating, based on 53 reviews. Scream single-handedly revitalized the slasher film genre in the late 1990s, similar to the impact Halloween (1978) had on late 1970s film, by using a standard concept with a tongue-in-cheek approach that combined straightforward scares with dialogue that satirized slasher film conventions. Following the film's success, two sequels were released in 1997 and 2000 respectively, and a third sequel is scheduled for release April 15, 2011. Plot A 17-year-old high school student named Casey Becker (Drew Barrymore) is waiting for her 18-year-old boyfriend Steve Orth (Kevin Patrick Walls) when a mysterious person (voiced by Roger L. Jackson) contacts her on the phone. Harmless at first, the caller starts to threaten Casey, telling her that he is somewhere outside the house watching her. When Casey warns him that Steve will arrive soon, the caller reveals that he has Steve tied up outside the patio. Now hysterical, Casey is forced to answer questions focused on horror movie clichés. She answers the second question wrong, resulting in Steve's death. When Casey refuses to answer the last question, the killer breaks into her house, revealed to be a man dressed in a ghostly costume named Ghostface. Ghostface chases her outside and stabs her in the chest, and when Casey sees her parents coming home, she is unable to call for help and is stabbed two more times. Her parents then find her body hanging from a tree outside, bloodied and gutted. The timing of the tragedy is hard on their classmate Sidney Prescott (Neve Campbell), who is attempting to cope with the upcoming one-year anniversary of her mother's rape and murder. The following night she is contacted by the Ghostface killer, who taunts Sidney over the phone and then attacks her in her home. Reacting to circumstantial evidence, Sidney accuses her boyfriend Billy Loomis (Skeet Ulrich) of being the attacker. Because her father is away on business, she spends the following night with her best friend Tatum (Rose McGowan) and Tatum's brother Dwight "Dewey" Riley (David Arquette), a deputy on the police force. While there, she receives another taunting phone call from Ghostface, who tells Sidney that she "fingered the wrong man...again," implying that the man convicted of killing Sidney's mother, Cotton Weary (Liev Schreiber), was actually innocent. This phone call seems to clear Billy, who is still in jail. Suspicion falls on Sidney's father (Lawrence Hecht), who turns out to be missing. Sidney is forced to deal with the scandalization of her attack by tabloid television newswoman Gale Weathers (Courteney Cox), who previously authored a book accusing Sidney's mother of having an affair with Cotton Weary and essentially calling Sidney an outright liar, leading to bitter mistrust between Gale and Sidney. With the killer still loose, and a number of students wearing Ghostface masks as pranks, school is canceled as a precautionary measure, and the principal (Henry Winkler) is stabbed to death. Unaware of the principal's fate, Tatum's boyfriend Stuart "Stu" Macher (Matthew Lillard) throws a party; among the guests are Billy and Sidney, who reconcile through sexual intercourse, and film buff Randy Meeks (Jamie Kennedy), who explains to the other party-goers the genre conventions a movie character is required to follow in order to survive a horror film. Tatum goes into the garage to get some more beer for the party, but instead fights with Ghostface. As she tries to escape, her head gets trapped in the garage door and Ghostface activates it, causing her head to get crushed between the door and the ceiling. Meanwhile Gale, sensing the potential for a scoop, crashes the party and hides a video camera inside the house. As Dewey and Gale investigate the mysterious appearance of Mr. Prescott's car, the party-goers receive word of the principal's death and most of them head to the school. With few party goers left, Ghostface starts to stalk those who remain behind. While saving Randy from being stabbed from behind by Ghostface, Gale's cameraman Kenny (W. Earl Brown) is murdered as Ghostface slices his throat. Ghostface then attacks and wounds Billy, Dewey, and Sidney. Meanwhile Gale, after discovering Kenny's bloody corpse, drives but loses control and crashes the car down a hill. Sidney encounters Randy and Stu, who both accuse each other of being the killer; not knowing which one to trust, Sidney locks them both out of the house. Billy falls down the stairs, apparently seriously injured, and lets Randy into the house. Randy claims that Stu has gone mad, but Billy replies that "We all go a little mad sometimes" (quoting a line by Norman Bates from Psycho) and shoots Randy. Billy and Stu reveal that they are both the killer, and have been using a voice-changing device to make them seem like just one person over the phone. They also reveal that they murdered Sidney's mother the previous year, as she had an affair with Billy's father and caused Billy's mother to leave; Stu claims "peer pressure" as his motive. They framed Cotton Weary for the crimes; similarly, they plan to frame Sidney's father for their current murder spree by planting evidence on his body. They stab each other to create the illusion that they have been attacked by Sidney's father, but Billy cuts too deeply, and Stu starts to die from blood loss. Gale attempts to rescue Sidney and her father, but she is easily subdued when she fails to disengage the safety on her gun. However, Gale's interference does serve as a distraction which allows Sidney to escape. She returns to taunt and attack Billy and Stu; in the struggle that follows, she is subdued by Stu and Billy, but she kills Stu by pushing a television on his head. Randy regains consciousness after surviving his gunshot wound, but is then punched in the face by Billy, stunning him. Just when Billy is about to kill Sidney, Gale saves Sidney's life by shooting him and hitting his shoulder. Sidney, Randy, and Gale take one last look at Billy's body. Presumably dead, Billy springs to life one more time (a horror convention which Randy had predicted), but Sidney quickly shoots him again through the head, killing him. In the epilogue, Dewey is carried away on a stretcher, wounded but alive, and Gale makes an impromptu news report on the events of the previous night as the authorities arrive. Cast *David Arquette as Deputy Dwight "Dewey" Riley *Neve Campbell as Sidney Prescott *Courteney Cox as Gale Weathers *Matthew Lillard as Stuart "Stu" Macher *Rose McGowan as Tatum Riley *Skeet Ulrich as Billy Loomis *Jamie Kennedy as Randy *W. Earl Brown as Kenny *Joseph Whipp as Sheriff Burke *Liev Schreiber as Cotton Weary *Drew Barrymore as Casey Becker *Roger L. Jackson as Ghostface (voice) *Kevin Patrick Walls as Steven "Steve" Orth *Lawrence Hecht as Neil Prescott *Henry Winkler as Principal Himbry (uncredited) *C.W. Morgan as Mr. Loomis *Lynn McRee as Maureen Prescott *Wes Craven as Fred the Janitor (uncredited cameo) Category:Movies